Patrons

Our Patrons

Emeritus Professor Sir Gustav Nossal AC CBE

The Penington Institute’s Chief Patron, Sir Gustav Nossal, is one of Australia’s most prominent scientists and was Australian of the Year in 2000.

Sir Gustav was born in Austria in 1931 and came to Australia in 1939. In 1965 he was appointed Director of The Walter and Eliza Hall Institute of Medical Research, a position he held from 1965 to 1996.

Among his many other past and current leadership roles he was President of both the Australian Academy of Science and the International Union of Immunological Societies, which is the world body of immunology.

Dame Marie is the former Governor of New South Wales (2001-2014) and former Chancellor of the University of Sydney (2007-2012). She was NSW’s first female Governor.

Dame Marie graduated from the University of Sydney in 1956 with a Bachelor of Medicine and Bachelor of Surgery. After completion of postgraduate studies in psychiatry, she was made a Member of the Royal Australian and New Zealand College of Psychiatrists in 1971, becoming a Fellow in 1980. She has held various medical positions, with a particular emphasis on psychiatry.

Professor Cory is a distinguished Australian molecular biologist. She completed her BSc and MSc at the University of Melbourne and obtained her PhD from the MRC Laboratory of Molecular Biology (LMB) in Cambridge, England. She has been awarded Doctor of Science (Honoris Causa) degrees from the University of Sydney, University of Oxford and Rockefeller University and, in 2015, a Doctor of Laws (Honoris Causa) from the University of Melbourne.

Emeritus Professor de Kretser served as the 28th Governor of Victoria (2006-2011) and is a distinguished reproductive endocrinologist.

Following completion of his Bachelor of Medicine and Bachelor of Surgery at the University of Melbourne, he undertook a research-based Doctorate of Medicine at Monash University entitled ‘Studies on the structure and function of the human testis’.

Trained initially in veterinary science and pathology, Peter Doherty is known for his fundamental research in viral immunity. Jointly with Swiss scientist Rolf Zinkernagel, he was awarded the US Albert Lasker Award for Basic Medical Research (1995) and the Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine (1996).

Named a Companion of the Order of Australia in 1997 during his tenure as Australian of the Year, he has received numerous other awards, honorary degrees, memberships of national academies and so forth as recognition for his discoveries with Zinkernagel.

Professor Margaret Hamilton has more than 40 years’ experience in the drug and alcohol field.

Her background is in social work and public health, and her broad range of research has included epidemiology and policy.

Among many influential roles, she is: an executive member of the Australian National Council on Drugs; the President of the Cancer Council Victoria; a Board member of VicHealth; Patron of DANA (Drug and Alcohol Nurses of Australasia); and a Life Governor of the Australian Drug Foundation.

Professor Barry Jones has been a politician, high school teacher, television and radio performer, university lecturer and lawyer. He took a leading role in campaigns to abolish the death penalty and revive the Australian film industry and achieved a national reputation as a quiz champion. In 1999 he was appointed an adjunct professor at Monash University and became a Vice-Chancellor’s Fellow at the University of Melbourne in 2005.

His best-selling book Sleepers, Wake! (1982) was translated into four languages.

Mr Kirby is one of Australia’s most eminent jurists and academics and is actively involved in human rights issues. A former Justice of the High Court, his other judicial roles have included inaugural Chairman of the Australian Law Reform Commission; judge of the Federal Court; and President of the New South Wales Court of Appeal.

Mr Kirby’s subsequent leadership roles have included appointments to the United Nations Development Program Global Commission on HIV and the Law; the UNAIDS and Lancet Commission: From AIDS to Sustainable Health; and as Chair of the UN Human Rights Council Commission of Inquiry on alleged human rights violations in North Korea.

The Penington Institute is named in honour of one of its patrons, Emeritus Professor David Penington AC.

One of Australia’s leading public intellectuals and health experts, he has courageously advocated for sensible drug policy in his roles as former chairman of the National AIDS Task Force, the Victorian Premier’s Drug Advisory Council, and the Victorian Government’s Drug Policy Expert Committee.

His unstinting efforts over many years helped to make Australia a world leader in HIV/AIDS public health strategies and in combating the HIV/AIDS epidemic.

Professor Fiona Stanley AC is a leading child and public health researcher. She is widely recognised for her promotion of maternal and child health and is considered to be Australia’s most respected paediatric epidemiologist.

Professor Stanley is the Founding Director and Patron of the Telethon Kids Institute, a Distinguished Research Professor in the School of Paediatrics and Child Health at the University of Western Australia and Vice-Chancellor’s Fellow at the University of Melbourne.